Evermore (general readers)

Trooper black and rebel motley were equally blotched with green shadows and varicolored tree saps. It was hard to tell who your friends were in the forest. But then, it had been hard to tell who his friends were for a long time. Even before Avon shot Blake. Blake pinched off the thought. Avon was dead and Blake couldn't afford distraction.

The battle was noisy and confusing. At one point, Blake shot at a patch of black only to have a large bird land at his feet, squawking avian curses. Startled, he paused, and slowly realized the battle was over. All he could hear were his people panting for breath, the wounded groaning. The troopers were all dead or fled. Relieved, Blake put away his weapon and turned to see to the wounded. Behind him the bird let out a particularly loud protest.

Blake turned back. He could afford a moment's mercy to end its suffering. The bird stood its ground on strong black legs, wounded wing dragging and eyes glittering like jet beads. Blake put his hand around its neck, surprised that it made no attempt to evade capture. It stared directly into his face as he prepared to snap its neck.

He couldn't do it. "I'm getting soft in my old age." Blake opened his hand. The bird made a sharp noise, and Blake would have sworn it was laughing at him. "All right, so you were someone's pet." The bird nipped at his fingers with its sharp beak. "Ah! A badly trained pet." Blake picked the bird up and stuffed it inside his shirt. "Be good." The bird scrabbled around for a few seconds, and then settled down to lie still, making small muttering complaints. Blake grinned, feeling absurdly pleased by the warmth against his chest.

He took the bird back to camp, and once the human casualties were treated, he asked the medic to look at it. "I'm not a zoologist!" the young man protested.

Blake shrugged. "It's wounded. You could try." He set the bird down on the makeshift treatment table. It ruffled its feathers, but then settled down and stared into Blake's eyes the whole time the medic set its broken wing.

"You know, people say those birds are evil," the medic commented as he put away his supplies. "Black feathers, black heart, as the saying goes."

"I never judge a bird by its appearance." Blake held out his arm, and the bird climbed up to sit on his shoulder.

"The Devil's been at it again." An annoyed rebel stood at the entrance to Blake's tent.

Blake sighed and took off his backpack. His pet, who had earned the name 'Devil' by its wicked sense of humour, was an inveterate thief. It particularly liked shiny bits of tech and would stuff them into Blake's backpack when he wasn't looking. "What's he taken now?"

"Only the code-transponder we were two weeks getting. Why don't you put him in a cage, or at least clip his wings!"

"No, I won't take the chance on him being left helpless, to die alone." The rebel watched as Blake opened the backpack and rummaged around until he found the code-transponder, trading a silver stud for the device to mollify the raven. It muttered angrily before accepting the trade and tucking the stud in with the rest of its loot.

Guy examined the transponder. "Lucky Devil, he's broken the code!" Devil preened his feathers, while Blake gave the bird an odd look.

"See what you can pick up, then," Blake said, dismissing the rebel. He put his arm in front of Devil, and as usual, the raven studied it for a moment, and then marched up to sit on Blake's shoulder. However annoying Devil could be, the one thing he'd never done was mess on Blake's clothes. Devil chuckled to himself, and played with Blake's hair. When Guy had gone, Blake turned to look at the bird. "If I didn't know better..."

Devil tilted his head and opened his beak slightly. Blake smiled, and offered him a slice of jerked meat. "But of course, I do know better." Blake stroked the bird's breast feathers lightly as it ate. "You do remind me of him, Devil. I still miss him." The bird nipped at his fingers, and he laughed.

"Quiet, now," Blake whispered, crouched in the undergrowth with Devil perched on his shoulder. He was talking to himself; birdcalls wouldn't disturb his quarry. He was after very big game, a predator of worlds. Among the first intercepted messages was one that said the Commissioner for Pacification would be making an inspection, presumably to ask why Horizon was still holding out.

"Blake!" a harsh voice shouted.

Blake stood up in surprise, Devil fluttering and cawing as the bird tried to keep its balance. A strongly built, red-headed man in the uniform of a Space Major grinned at Blake. "Your lot never learns, do you? That message was from me! You're trapped this time." The man's lone eye glittered like green glass. "Prepare to die, Blake!"

"Travis! No! I want Blake alive!" Servalan strode out into the open, surrounded by mutoids.

"Well, I don't!" The one-eyed man jerked his gun up and fired point-blank at Blake. There was a sharp pain in Blake's shoulder and he was pushed back... but not by weapons' fire. It happened so quickly, all he remembered later was Devil shouting, "Blake!" as it leapt from his shoulder, and a scream from Travis as the bird tore out his remaining eye.

Blake whirled and took advantage of the shock to slaughter the mutoids, their reflexes slowed by the lack of orders. He grabbed Servalan roughly, and forced her to face the man writhing and moaning on the ground. "You..." Blake stopped talking when he saw the crumpled ball of scorched black feathers beside Travis. He knocked Servalan to the ground. "Bastards," he said softly, and picked up the limp carcass of the bird.

Servalan opened her mouth to protest. Blake stepped over her, and shot Travis in the head. Then he stared down at her. After a long moment she asked, "Was that revenge or mercy?"

Blake looked at Servalan as he tucked the bird inside his shirt. "Does it matter? Either way, you wouldn't understand."

A year later, the rebellion was making slow progress. Servalan had provided some useful information before she seduced her guard and then escaped, leaving the hapless woman with a knife in her back. Avalon had conscripted Blake to her headquarters, saying that he was more valuable as a tactician than a guerrilla. Blake disagreed, but considered that some time looking at the overview would help him decide where he could be most useful. It was dead bloody boring, though. Blake looked up wearily at the sounds of scuffling in the corridor outside his office. He pushed aside the stacks of paperwork and went to see what was happening.

He blinked in surprise. Two men were hanging onto the arms of a young woman while a third man moved in close, saying, "No one gets to see Blake without being searched!" The woman lifted up, using the two men holding her for leverage, and kicked the third man in the crotch. He collapsed with a screech, clutching at himself.

Blake stepped in, intrigued by the wicked grin on the woman's face. She obviously wasn't in the slightest intimidated. "Enough!" Blake growled. "What's all this?"

"New recruit, trying to break in to see you, Blake," the man holding her left arm said.

"Sinofar sent me." The woman looked up at Blake, brown hair tousled and half covering her large dark eyes.

Blake lifted his chin in surprise. "Let her go. I'll talk to her."

Grumbling, the men released the woman. "And take Jon to see the doctor." Blake turned towards the woman. "Follow me."

She muttered something Blake refused to interpret as, "Do I have a choice?" as she obeyed.

"What do you know about Sinofar?" Blake asked the moment the door shut behind the woman.

She rolled her eyes. "You impressed her. So much so that she wasn't satisfied with giving you a head start over Travis. The first Travis." The woman sat in the nearest chair and pointed at Blake using both the index and middle finger in a curious gesture he'd only known one other person to utilize. "I'm supposed to help you. If you'll let me. I told her you never did before, but... "

Blake shook his head. "This is too fantastic."

"Is it? We encountered stranger things in our years together."

"Stranger than reincarnation? And as a woman? Who really sent you? Travis must have reported what happened."

The woman looked down at herself and sighed. "I told her you wouldn't take me seriously. All right, ask me a question, any question that only you and Avon could answer."

Blake gnawed on a knuckle for a moment as he thought. So much of their time together had been witnessed by others and the private times were unmemorable, even to Blake - arguing while playing chess, mainly. "Why did you push me out of the way of the bomb Cally planted on Saymon's orders, the time we were caught in the web?"

The woman flushed. "Reflex. Automatic reaction. I was as surprised as you were."

Blake smiled. "Yes." He paused. "All right. I could use a computer expert. And a friend. But what do I call you now?"

The woman sighed again and met Blake's eyes. "Carr, Yvonne Carr."

The rebel listening outside Blake's door just in case the new recruit was a Federation plant straightened in relief at the sound of Blake's laughter. Maybe she would be good for Blake.

Note: There was a tie in the voting, so I went with the easier one. :^) . This was #10 on my ballotFandom: Blakes 7Blake survives GP, while Avon dies. Blake continues to fight- in jungle warfare he accidentally injures a raven, which he keeps as a pet. It dies saving him, croaking out one word, 'Blake' in Avon's voice, as it dies. But it doesn't end there...(Gen) All audiences.